


The Ballad of Mr. X

by rosa_himmelblau



Series: The Swiped from rheasilvia Live Journal 2009 Crossover Challenge [1]
Category: Twin Peaks, Wiseguy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:47:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24009841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosa_himmelblau/pseuds/rosa_himmelblau
Summary: It takes a very special agent to guard Sonny Steelgrave in protective custody.
Relationships: Sonny Steelgrave/Vinnie Terranova
Series: The Swiped from rheasilvia Live Journal 2009 Crossover Challenge [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1731601





	The Ballad of Mr. X

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gweneiriol](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gweneiriol/gifts).



> I knew there were four of these stories written in this particular universe. I'd completely forgotten about the other stories also written for this crossover challenge.
> 
> This is the first one.

Sonny had been pacing, straight back and forth across the dull living room with the occasional detour around the sofa. The place looked as though it had been decorated by someone who was afraid the rooms themselves might be noticed, all off-white and tan and beige and other non-colors that blended into each other. Sonny was lucky to be able to see the sofa sitting there to detour around it, it was so close in color to the rug. At least they weren't making him dress in those non-colors.

Finally when he'd gotten tired of pacing and thinking, he lay down on the beige sofa in the beige room in a patch of sunshine, and opened the newspaper to read while he contemplated ways of killing Vinnie. He'd had to move the sofa so it was in the sunshine, but it was worth it. They wouldn't let him look out the windows.

His favorite method would be to use his hands, just his hands, only he wasn't sure that would work. Vinnie was pretty damn strong, and it wasn't as though he'd just lie there and let Sonny hold his throat closed until he was dead.

His second favorite method was to use a knife, cut an artery, let Vinnie bleed out. That could take a while, and it would give them some time to talk. And Sonny didn't mind a little blood, or even a whole lot of blood.

There was a small knock at the door, which Sonny ignored. It would be followed by a second, louder knock, which would in turn be followed by the door opening and his name being called.

No, not his name. And not even that strange name he had to pretend was his.

The name was all right, but Sonny didn't like being called by it. He hated the beige room, but the sofa was the only place he could get some direct sunlight.

Maybe he wouldn't kill Vinnie. Maybe—

" . . . dinner's ready."

Sonny was hungry, so he got up off the sofa and followed the fed to the kitchen where the windows were shuttered but the food smelled good.

"Are you sure you're a fed?" he asked the young man sitting across from him. He set a good table, whatever he was.

"Would you like to see my badge again, sir?"

Sonny almost smiled. This was ridiculous, he was developing a soft spot for cops—now he found himself liking one even when he **knew** he was a cop! That was another reason to kill Vinnie.

Cooper wasn't the first special agent they'd had babysitting him. Special agent. They were all called that, how special could they be if they were all supposed to be special? Probably they were supposed to be special compared to the rest of the world. That sounded like how the feds saw themselves, except maybe for Vinnie. But probably he was just hiding it. Maybe Sonny would ask him, before he killed him.

The first babysitter Sonny had had was Frank McPike, and that had worked out real good for Sonny, which was why McPike only lasted three days. Sonny refused to talk to him at all, pretended they weren't even sharing the bland little beige house. Since McPike was supposed to be getting additional information from him, that was a problem—for McPike. And when McPike complained to whoever his boss was, Sonny had pretended to have no idea what he was talking about. He hadn't planned to do it, but the look on McPike's face made the best thing he could have come up with.

The second time McPike called about what he called "Steelgrave's unresponsiveness," he got reprimanded for calling Sonny by his real name, and his ability to do his job was questioned. Sonny thought he was going to stroke out right there in the little beige house, blood pouring out of his ears and ruining the beige rug.

The third time he called, McPike quit. The next day there was a different special agent there.

That turned out to be an even bigger mess for the feds. McPike was waiting for him on the front porch, and Sonny was upstairs, just out of the shower. He had the curtains drawn shut but the window open, and he could hear the hand-off going on below, heard McPike wish the new special agent more luck than he'd had, heard him say, "If I had to stay here one more day with him, I was going to shoot one of us!" Sonny got a good laugh out of that.

The new special agent, Danny Greenbaum, lasted even less time than McPike. In fact, when Sonny came down stairs, Greenbaum took one look at Sonny and walked out and, from what Sonny could glean, got on a plane to some country that didn't have extradition. He'd been on Sonny's payroll, and when he saw Sonny, he panicked and disappeared to some third-world hellhole that was probably worse than prison. He wasn't even smart enough to pick a nice non-extradition country to disappear to.

Sonny stayed alone in the house for a whole day and a half before anyone realized he had no babysitter. Your government in action. The reason Sonny didn't split was, they'd frozen his accounts and he couldn't get to his cash without somebody knowing he hadn't really been knifed in a holding cell.

Sonny found out that McPike hadn't really quit when he showed up with a whole swarm of special agents who were there to sort out the mess they alternately blamed either him or McPike for. There was even talk of digging up the backyard, to see if Sonny had killed Greenbaum and buried his body, when McPike—to give credit where it was due—pointed out that if Sonny **had** buried Greenbaum, the spot would be pretty obvious after only a day and a half.

They wanted to know why Sonny hadn't called, and Sonny had told them that a) he hadn't been given a number to call, should his federally appointed watchdog run away, and b) he'd been told about a million times he wasn't allowed to use the phone. Sonny had thought about making a phone call, but the only one he could think of to call was Vinnie. Vinnie would find it as funny as he did, but he'd still tattle on him.

Maybe Sonny would just shoot him in the heart.

They gave Sonny two lie detector tests before they finally got around to just asking him just what had happened. Sonny asked if they had the records he'd kept of just which feds were on his payroll, and they did, and finally some brain trust found Greenbaum's name on it. McPike looked ready to shoot everybody in the room except maybe Sonny. Sonny was sure he heard him repeatedly muttering, "Incompetents," under his breath. They tried to talk McPike into staying there again, and if he'd agreed, Sonny might have actually talked to him, but McPike just rolled his eyes and walked out without even answering. Unless you counted slamming the door an answer.

Cooper, the third special agent, if he really was an agent of any kind, seemed to be the one who would stick.

He dressed better than most FBI agents Sonny had seen—he looked like the kind of bodyguard Pat the Cat would have chosen, if he could. And he was simultaneously quite serious and kind of goofy; he talked to himself when he thought Sonny couldn't hear. Pat the Cat would never have put up with that kind of thing, but as far as Sonny was concerned, there were worse things in the world than a guy who talked to himself.

The thing was, this Cooper treated Sonny with respect. Feds didn't do that, not even when they wanted something from you, feds made it very clear they hated your guts and would like to see you dead. Except for Vinnie, but he was only pretending. And anyway, the idea that Vinnie would treat anybody with much respect was far-fetched. But it was this attitude of Cooper's that Sonny kept wondering if he really was a fed.

...

November 14, 6:09 a.m.

Diane, this new assignment is quite interesting. According to Gordon, I was chosen for my temperament and professionalism, which I take as a great compliment. There were issues with the first two agents watching—

And here we run into an issue of secrecy. I'm not at liberty to divulge the name of the man I'm protecting—not his old name or the new one Witness Protection Services has given him. To add to that, I'm not allowed to call the man by his old name when speaking to him, but he refuses to answer to his new name. For this reason I've been calling him Mr. X. He seems amused by this, and will respond to it.

As I was saying, there were issues with the first two agents. The first, Frank McPike, had a personality conflict with Mr. X—a true personality conflict, in that the arrest and prosecution of Mr. X had become personal on both sides, and Mr. X refused to talk to Agent McPike.

Agent McPike was replaced with another agent, a Daniel Greenbaum, who was apparently compromised, and rather than face being found out, he absconded to Libya. Why he chose Libya—beyond their lack of diplomatic relations or extradition treaty with the US—remains a mystery.

Unlike Agent McPike, I'm having very little difficulty extracting information from Mr. X. Like most "mastermind criminals"—that is, those who might be called idea men, his ego demands a great deal of attention and admiration. Agent McPike's personal antipathy for Mr. X made him unsuited for the job, whereas I, with no personal feelings for the man, see this as nothing more than the most effective interrogation technique. If approached correctly, he's more than happy to boast about his ideas, particularly those in relation to dealing with threats from Paul Patrice, also known as Pat the Cat.

Mr. X is out of the shower now, and will be ready for breakfast soon. I've been doing the cooking—a subservience that is one of the things that keeps him willing to talk to me.

More later, Diane.

...

Cooper had made a really good breakfast and washed the dishes, then cleaned off the kitchen table. It was where they went over Sonny's records. "Mr. X, there's something we're having trouble understanding. You've given us so many names of various government employees that you've been paying, that number seems all out of proportion to the actual size of your unlawful business enterprises."

This was a perfect example, it was the kind of thing Sonny ought to be insulted by, only Cooper made it seem as though he was talking about some kind of miscalculation in the books, instead of calling Sonny a crook. He liked the Mr. X thing, too. It made him feel like a secret agent.

"As far as we know," Cooper went on, "you don't have much business in New York, but according to your records, you've been paying off a high number of police officers, judges, and other city officials. And you didn't mention any of them when you were deposed."

Sonny took a sip of his coffee, considering how he wanted to answer this. He drank some more coffee—the guy made really good coffee. What difference did it make what he told him about how he did business? How he used to do business, since no matter what happened after this, he wasn't going to be able to go back to his old life. Sonny Steelgrave was dead.

"I didn't mention them because I didn't think about them," Sonny said when his cup was empty. He set it down, and Cooper refilled it. "They weren't pay-offs, exactly."

Cooper was pouring himself some more coffee, too. He also drank it black. Vinnie always dumped sugar in his coffee, like a kid trying to make oatmeal taste good. Why did he even drink coffee, if he didn't like the way it tasted.

"I don't understand," Cooper said

"I don't either," Sonny said, then realized Cooper wasn't talking about Vinnie's coffee preferences. "I wasn't paying them to look the other way when one of my guys got pinched. I was paying them for information on Patrice and his guys, and to maybe lean a little heavier on 'em than they might've. I gave these guys a little money, they kept me informed of what was going on in Patrice's territory, who was getting busted, what they were doing, any information that came their way. And instead of letting 'em off so easy, keep 'em off the streets a little longer, cut into his action. Is that against the law, paying the cops a little extra to get 'em to do their jobs?"

Cooper looked thoughtful. "It's obstruction of justice, however you look at it, and it's against the rules of conduct. Even if they aren't prosecuted, they'll most likely lose their jobs and pensions."

Sonny nodded. He didn't care what happened to those guys, he hadn't forced them to take his money, he hadn't threatened them. He'd just made an offer and they'd said yes. What happened after that was their problem.

...

At Sonny's insistence they played gin for an hour before they went back to work. Cooper kept letting him win, which annoyed Sonny because he could win without anybody letting him. Well, except against Vinnie, who was really, really good at cards.

"I was asked to leave a casino once," Cooper volunteered.

Sonny pushed the cards together in a messy pile, straightened them out, then started shuffling. "Lemme guess: you were counting cards."

Cooper smiled. "I had no idea it wasn't allowed."

Sonny laughed. "The house's gotta have an edge. Whose joint were you in?"

"Oh, this was in Las Vegas."

"How were you doing before they caught you?" Sonny asked.

Cooper's smile grew wider. "I understand why they wanted me to leave."

Just thinking about Vegas depressed Sonny's mood. He hated Vegas, he hated the desert, and he hated the way they acted in Vegas, like they'd invented gambling and nobody else knew how to run a casino. Not that he was going to be running any casinos anymore. What was he going to be doing? Where were they going to put him?

There was no point asking Cooper. All that was the responsibility of the U.S. Marshals, but not until the frisbees got done extracting all the information they could from his brain. He'd already given them all the Jersey cops and judges and other government employees on his payroll; now they were doing New York.

And Sonny was enjoying it, because while he wasn't technically betraying his oath, which included Pat the Cat, the things he was telling them would eventually lead back to Patrice's men which would lead to Patrice. Whether or not there was loyalty among thieves, there was no loyalty among Patrice's men, only fear. Patrice was a psycho, and all his people were afraid of him, which was why nobody'd ever flipped on him. But taking out one or two of Patrice's guys at a time wasn't enough to damage his organization. What Sonny was giving this centerfold fed would take out dozens of top-level guys, which would throw the whole organization into the kind of chaos Sonny's had been in after the one-two of Dave's death and the shoot-out with Sykes at the docks. Sonny had no idea who would move in on him, but whoever it was, Sonny hoped he came armed to the teeth.

And he hoped it wasn't Aldo. Sonny liked Aldo, but he wasn't smart enough to run an organization like Paul's, even if it was just handed to him. Trying to take it was way beyond his skill level, and no matter how good a team he put together, he'd still end up getting himself killed. And it wouldn't be two in the hat; Patrice would want to send a message.

"Too bad Theresa couldn't do it; she could take out Patrice, run his organization, and never miss an appointment with her hair dresser." Sonny didn't realize he'd said that aloud until he noticed Cooper looking at him inquisitively.

But Cooper was a quick study. "The reorganization isn't going to be pretty," he agreed. "There'll be a lot of bloodshed."

Sonny shrugged. He didn't mind blood, and it wasn't going to be his blood, anyway. And maybe they'd be too busy to look for a guy who was supposed to be dead.

...

November 17, 11:49 p.m.

Diane, I'm tired. Mr. X doesn't seem to require much sleep, but he does get bored easily and requires a good deal of entertainment. I may not have mentioned it, but normally guarding a witness is at least a two-man operation. However, due to budget cuts, individual assignments have been de-prioritized. Because Mr. X's cohorts believe him to have been killed in his holding cell, the odds are slim that anyone is looking for him at present. Therefore, I am the lone guardian of his security, but also his lone companion. And Diane, I believe Mr. X is lonely. I hear him talking to himself when he's alone.

Our routine has fallen into me making breakfast while he showers. After breakfast, we play gin for an hour. Mr. X is the second worst card player I have ever met. The worst is still my boyhood friend, Bradley Schlurman, who had the remarkable "tell" of mouthing the number and suit of each card in his hand as he organized them. Only a blind man would have had a difficult time beating Bradley.

I don't let him win every game—that would be an obvious tip-off. Mr. X has a terrible poker face, but he's not stupid.

After that we go over any information he might have inadvertently omitted during our earlier debriefings. Since we've been here over a week, there really isn't anything more that he's going to tell me. So I've been hearing a number of stories about running a casino. They're very entertaining, but I do wish the higher-ups would finish going over Mr. X's information so he can be moved on to his new life and I can move on to another case.

One thing about Mr. X that has concerned me: I've overheard him talking about murdering the covert agent who infiltrated his organization. I spoke to Gordon about this, and he has assured me that the agent is in protective custody.

And since then I've heard other things that have disturbed and saddened me. It seems that Mr. X formed a genuine attachment to the OCB agent, and is in real pain from the discovery that his friend was, in fact, investigating him for the FBI.

Diane, I understand that this is the way of the world, that we have no choice in using subterfuge in crime fighting. And I have no problem with that. But it's still difficult to see another human being—even a wrongdoer—in pain.

...

Sonny couldn't sleep again. He tried to think of ways of killing Vinnie, because that always relaxed him. Thinking about killing him was better than thinking of the things they've done together and the plans they'd made. He couldn't get his hopes up, he couldn't trust the things Vinnie had said weren't lies. Who knew how far he'd go to keep Sonny from killing him?

Was it all a lie? When the dust had settled and Sonny had settled someplace on the other side of the ocean, away from this whole mess, what would Vinnie do when Sonny called him? Give up that stupid government job and join him, or would he rat him out again?

If that happened, Sonny really would kill Vinnie. He might forgive him once, but twice? Forget about it.

In the meantime, he just had to be patient, play cards with this fed, and not think too hard about Terranova.


End file.
